Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Bahia Blanca to host Copa Patagonia in February

Image El Nacional

Between February 15 and 22 the Argentine city of Bahia Blanca will play host to the Copa Patagonia, a competition involving a vareity of different sports. At the international level it will feature the Argentine womens hockey team, Las Leoncitas in addition to Uruguay´s rugby team, Los Teros, and the Argentine A rugby team, Los Jaguares. Included in the Copa Patagonia to play rugby will be the two South American sides in addition to Christchurch Boys High School Old Boys from New Zealand. Old Boys is one of the biggest name amateur club sides in the world. Players to have played for the club include former All Blacks Graeme Bachop, Daryl Gibson, Richard Low, Justin Marshall, Aaron Mauger, Andrew Mehrtens, Luke Romano Reuben Thorne and the greatest points scorer in the history of rugby, Dan Carter. The competition is based on the ideals of playing cleanly, with respect and having fun. The same principles are often used to describe the spirit of rugby. The pre-season event, though, will be of much importance to the participants with there certain to be Argentine players in consideration for places in the Pampas XV squad to play in the Pacific Cup and Uruguay having a vital year of international competition. Uruguay is to use the opportunity to prepare its South America based players for the Rugby World Cup qualification matches against the USA in March. For the city of Bahía Blanca it is a unique opportunity to push for the right to host test rugby and be considered as a future option to host Rugby World Cup matches in the event that Argentina is allocated hosting rights. Bahía Blanca is based in the south of Buenos Aires province and is larger than all other cities in the country that are located further south. It has produced players of note including former Puma Bernardo Stortoni who played professional rugby in France, England and Scotland for Narbonne, Bristol, Rotherham and the Glasgow Warriors from 2001-2011 and was capped twenty-six times by Argentina.